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This 1939
Rolls-Royce Wraith Park Ward Enclosed Limousine arrived at her new home
in the Spring of 2006.
The engine
is a 4,227 cc inline six with cast iron block and an aluminum crankcase
split horizon-tally. The head is also cast iron with a cross-flow design.
In otherwise
fine shape, she smoked quite a bit from the crankcase breather tube
and this did not improve with use. Further invest-igation revealed zero
compression in the first cylinder. A leak-down test suggested broken
rings or a hole in the top of the piston.
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May 3,
2007
Day 1.
Take a deep breath and dive in!
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As
a first step, removing this center apron seemed innocuous enough. |
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Removal
of the headlights and stanchion tubes was next. |
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May 4,
2007
Removal
of the bonnet is easy, but a two person job, nevertheless.
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May 6,
2007
The throttle
and choke linkages have to be carefully removed and catalogued.
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May 12,
2007
The castellated
nut that ties the left hand fender to the stanchion tube assembly would
not release. If it had, I believe it is possible to remove the grill
and radiator as an assembly.
This case
became rather involved, but the recent delivery of Tom Wernholm's engine
lift made life a bit easier.
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May 21,
2007
In order
to remove the front engine support, the side steering tube has to be
disconnect at the ball joint in front. This requires heat and a 1-1/8
inch forked wedge.
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This is
the front engine support. The side steering tube minus ball joint is
in the lower left hand corner. Ball joint is resting upside down in
the lower center.
The temporary
support is visible behind and runs to the garage floor.
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May 27,
2007
Engine
removal day. Also Indianapolis 500 day, so we get a fairly early start.
Very thankful
to have Todd Nagler (l) come down from Rochester. He has forgotten more
about small HP Rolls-Royces than I have yet to learn!
Between
our good luck and some rain delays at Indy, we get to enjoy the majority
of the race including Marco Andretti's spectacular crash and Dario Franchiti's
win.
The author
(r) models the latest in shop wear.
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Wherever
there is an ambitious automotive project, Dave Hollister can be counted
on for expert advice and support.
Dave's
smile is a counterpoint to my anxiety over getting this engine quickly
to a firm resting place. There were only 492 of these cars made, after
all!
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The
engine leaves quite a large space behind. This is a prime opportunity
for some heavy cleaning and some long overdue rewiring. |
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Here
we have the engine attached to the stand. The engine is so damned long,
I am concerned about its center of gravity relative to the length of the
stand's feet. The engine lift will stay in place until a suitable brace
can be constructed. |
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May 29,
2007
One of
the first orders of business is to remove the pushrods. The no. 4 pushrod
has a funny flange to it but the cup itself looks otherwise undamaged.
Not sure how this would happen given the shape of the rocker assembly.
Perhaps it was made this way??
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The engine
lift is used to remove the head. It is fairly heavy and darned awkward.
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This
is the cylinder that had no compression. Certainly no hole in the piston!
Also appears awfully clean indicating precious little combustion is taking
place. |
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This
is what the remainder of the piston tops look like. |
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Note the
angle iron stand used to aid in support of the engine.
Generator
and water pump have been removed.
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May 30,
2007
All of
the water jackets look relatively clean.
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June 1,
2007
With the
engine now rotated upside down, the engine lift is used to provide some
preload to lower crankcase half while the studs attahced to the upper
half are tapped with a drift.
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June 4,
2007
With the
lower crankcase shell off and out of the way, the big end bearing caps
are accessible. Three pistons including #1 had broken rings.
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The
big end bearing on #4 had fractured and begun to spin. |
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Close-up
of upper hald of big end bearing #4. |
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Nice
view of crankshaft with connecting rods removed. |
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Next task
is to remove the vibration damper from the nose of the crankshaft.
Removing
the front third is a simple matter of removing the twelve 2BA nuts (with
3/16 BSF heads) and locking tab washers (LTW's) from the outer periphery
and the four 1/4 BSF nuts and LTW's from closest to the center.
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June
7, 2007
The rest
requires a special tool from the dark recesses of Dan Docherty's shop
in Windsor, Ontario. Thank you Dan!
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Although
you cannot tell from this distance, I did mark the relative positions
of the crank pinion and cam wheel so that everything will have the proper
timing upon reassembly. |
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June 9,
2007
Crankshaft
is marked with engine serial number.
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Main
bearing caps are off. No ugly surprises. |
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Note
huge bearing surface on #7. Wow. |
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Crankshaft
is ready to come out. |
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June
23, 2007
Remove
carburetor from intake manifold.
Also removed
exhaust manifold from head. Intake manifold doesn't want to come off
yet... letting that fester with some penetrating oil.
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June 24,
2007
Crankshaft
removed from upper crankcase.
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Measuring
bore diameters. Largest measurement an inch down from the top is 3.5100
with 3.5035 typical. Will measure bottom of bores tomorrow. |
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June
30, 2007
There
are 13 sludge traps in the crank shaft. One for each big end and main
bearing.
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They
are sealed by pairs of conical plugs pulled into their seats by a long
bolt and castellated nut. |
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How
much sludge could there be? Apparently, quite a bit. This trap is 60%
filled with sludge. |
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This
handlful of detritus is all from the trap concentric to big end bearing
#1. |
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July
4, 2007
Time to
bring out the big guns. I want to put in a new pilot bearing and to
do that the flywheel must be separated from the crankshaft. The flywheel
is attached to the crankshaft with 12 bolts that are peened over onto
their nuts.
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Voila! |
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Here's
the pilot bearing hidden by the crankshaft. |
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July 5,
2007
Planned
to remove the dynamo drive gears this evening but it looks like I will
need a small gear puller.
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With
Joe the Housepainter's help, the block is lifted off of the upper crankcase. |
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This
exposes the tappets, which were numbered and removed. |
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Since
the crankcase is aluminum and all of the studs are steel, all need to
be removed before chemical cleaning. |
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Progress... |
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July
6, 2007
Each of
the camshaft bearings is held in place by a dowel pin. The middle five
dowel pins are inserted from the top of the crankcase and visible only
with the block removed.
Fortunately
for removal, the pins are hollow and threaded. If you happen to know
all this, removal is straightforward.
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And
there they are! |
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July 7,
2007
After
returning home from the 2007 RROC Motor Region Annual Picnic, I discovered
a disconcerting puddle of gasoline forming underneath the Silver Shadow.
Wraith
work is suspended for a few days to attend to this.
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The
tank forms part of the boot floor. Once the gas line is disconnected from
underneath the tank comes up and out. |
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July 10,
2007
Back to
the distributor drive: the flexible drive and shaft have been removed.
After
the keeper is removed, that large nut is next.
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I wish
someone had told me that the G. D. nut was left hand thread!
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The
gear itself is proving to be very stubborn. It's been sitting like this
with pressure from the gear puller for about 24 hrs. or so... |
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July
15, 2007
Well,
I'm know when I'm beaten. I have dis-mounted the upper crankcase so
that I can take it to Dan Docherty in Windsor tomorrow. He knows more
about Rolls-Royce gear cases than anyone I know and owns a transmission
shop full of gear pullers.
The block,
fan pulley, vibration damper pressure plate, crank-shaft and flywheel
are at B&F Machining in Ply-mouth for cleaning. The block and crank
will be analyzed and the flywheel turned down to a fresh surface.
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This
is the center and rear plates of the vibration damper. The eight (actually
sixteen) springs need to be removed to get the plates apart and remove
the old cotton duck friction material. |
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One
side of each spring rests in a spring pocket and the other does not. Pays
to know which is which so you can pry the little boogers out! |
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Success.
The center friction plate is in great shape with 0.1275 thickness. Minimum
is 0.6200, so we're good.
Didn't
have a chance to measure depth on the rear, but I'm guessing we're good
there as well.
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Next is
the lower crankcase. A few items need to removed before cleaning.
Oh! By
the way, I got the refurbished fuel tank for the Silver Shadow back
on the 12th and had her back together and running like a champ Saturday
morning.
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This
is a close-up of the float mechanism that registers the oil level. This
all comes out. The float is made out of wood.
Update
on subcontracted items:
The flywheel,
wheel case cover, block and all four pieces of the vibration damper
are at B&F to be cleaned and machined.
Dan has
the upper crankcase at his shop in Windsor and is endeavoring to remove
the cam gear and distributor drive gear.
Dave Cunningham
is refurbishing the carburetor.
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This
is the lower half of the rear main seal. The seal set into the channel
is made from felt. |
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July 21,
2007
No before
photos, but here is the chassis undertray that goes beneath the transmission.
This took
quite a bit of work to remove decades of crud. It's made from stamped
aluminum with steel reinforcements on the edges where it is attached
to the frame.
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Undertray
that is positioned beneath engine. Largest cutout is for front exhaust
silencer. |
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July 22,
2007
Rocker
cover has nasty brazed repair to left side. The cylinder above it is
the intake silencer with a rudimentary oil mesh air cleaner on the left
hand side of the photo.
All of
this has been disassembled to facilitate making a nicer repair and repainting
the lot.
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This
precision leveraging device was used to separate the intake manifold from
the head. |
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This
upper radiator hose connection (and fan bracket) is attached to the head
with eight 1/4 BSF nuts. It also serves as a cover over the water passages
at the front of the head. |
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Front
of head: not too much corrosion. Head is cast iron. |
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This
is the back of the head with inspection cover removed. The eight slot
head countersunk screws are a little more of a challenge to remove. |
